Multi-ethnicity and development: the challenges of integration through development

Abstract

Sabah is a land of contrasts and diversity in terms of her ethnic composition. History (of the previous 100 years or so) has produced a plural situation in which ethnic boundaries, more often than not, coincide with geographical boundaries. This cultural-physical dilineation is further aggravated by unequal levels of integration, and hence, participation in the emergent, urban-oriented, national domain (politics, economy and culture). In the last three decades, Sabah has gone through a period of rapid change through urban transformations. In these transformations, multi-ethnicity in the composition of her indigenous population seems to be the constant, ever-present, latent factor in shaping the directions of development. The sharing of the development cake always becomes the invisible, problematic ethnic-related factor, the neglect of which may threaten the state of ethnic balance and solidarity in the state as well as in nation-building. This paper attempts to identify problems and challenges of creating sufficient space for integration into the mainstreams of politics, economy and culture through the developmental process, among the ethnic groups that comprise the Sabah population today.